From the 1st of May 2012 Tandem skydiving will be administered directly by the New Zealand Civil Aviation Authority rather than sporting bodies.

This sets a world wide precedent and goes some way in eliminating some of the problems of administering a commercial activity with sporting rules.

The New Rule part is called Civil Aviation Rule Part 115.

Before, all skydiving was administered by part 149 organisations, part 149 is a rule part designed for sporting activities.

Part 115 will administer commercial adventure aviation and covers other aviation activities also such as paragliding, hot air balloons, hang gliding, microlights and other General Aviation activities done for commercial purposes that are not considered Part 135 air transport.

The rules have been in the pipeline for about 20 years, as adventure tourism and therefore adventure aviation has grown significantly in NZ and the CAA have had pressure from the public and the Parliament to make commercial aviation operators more accountable.

The CAA understands that this precedent will likely be followed by other countries in the future. So it will be an interesting exercise for everyone to observe.

For skydiving it only covers Tandems and only tandems that re not a training jump.

So the argument that tandems are not a joy ride is no longer applicable, tandems under part 115 are a joyride and those under part 149 are a training jump.

My DZ has been working on our manual for about 2 years, fortunately my business partners are pilots that understand civil aviation rules very well and have managed to submit a manual that was accepted straight away.

I understand some drop zones in NZ failed to produce and adequate manual and were denied (and have to re submit) and some have not submitted a manual at all.

Those without accepted manuals ans I understand will have to refrain from taking tandem passengers from the 1st of May which is in 2 days time.

Aside from having to develop a complicated operations manual, the only real difference for the skydivers I can see is the way the instructors log their hours/flight and duty time. Which is quite simple. There are other subtle differences also but nothing too substantial.

The best thing in my mind is that the skydiving company (or club) that performs commercial tandem skydiving/holds a part 115 cert. is answerable directly to to CAA and not a part 149 organisation.

We are fortunate to be affiliated to a great part 149 that is owned by a non profit organisation and is very helpful and fair when it comes to rating and license approvals and compliance. In the past we were not so fortunate and were grounded because the CEO of the part 149 we belonged to, decided they would not comply with the CAA's requests.

A tandem parachute is now considered and aircraft and a tandem pilot is a pilot in command.

We are not allowed to work 7 consecutive days or more than 14 hours in one day.

It will be a very interesting exercise to say the least.

The CAA themselves are struggling to make the deadline. It was thought that the deadline would be extended but as the new law is a bill passed by Parliament that is impossible so it seems a few DZ's will not be able to operate as of Tuesday...

For those interested you will find further information in the following link.

Will CAA issue TIs with their licences - and if not which organisation will?

No, the CAA approve the operators certificate. The rating is issued by 'a' Part 149.

So instead of having to have all TM's rated by one particular 149 for each DZ. You can have TM's with ratings from different 149's if you wish.

This will make life easier than the current situation for TM's changing DZ's.

It does come down to how manual is written for any particular DZ, some DZ's may specify a particular 149 but ours does not. We will still use NZSA for foreign crossovers etc as they have been good to us and their fee structure and processing time is very reasonable. The NZSA also a non profit organisation as apposed to the other 2 organisations which are companies. This alone says a lot about the founders ethics.

It would not make sense for the CAA to issue tandem ratings ditrectly as tandems are not necessarily for commercial use, they can also be sporting jumps for training or simply for fun.

I believe all 3 part 149 organisations will remain, though I would like to see them amalgamate in the future.

No, it gives the monopoly back to the government, rather than a quango.

LOL, kind of.... Part 149's were/are not funded by the Government.

They are funded by the companies that hold operators certificates issued by them and the sport aviators that hold certificates issue by them.

If the board of directors of a part 149 organisation are also the owners of the companies that hold those operators certificates... then it is only natural that the said board of directors would discourage competition and therefore growth in the industry in the form of new operator certificates being issued.

A vast majority of the $30,000,000+ p/a commercial skydiving industry in New Zealand has been monopolised by a small handful of (about 6)mcompanies for over a decade.

The national sporting body is broke and there are minimal facilities available for sport skydivers.

Fortunately the commercial skydiving diploma school has allowed the sport to grow during the same period.

If NZ had taken the same route as Australia, the sporting body could be wealthy, the sport could be strong and the industry could have generated more revenue for our GDP.

It will also now be safer as aircraft and pilots will be subject by more stringent regulations.

The CAA are not in the business of making money, they are in the business of avoiding accidents and occurrences.

TAFF will not be subjected to part 115 regulations I believe. AFF is not, neither is sport jumping or even filming tandems as an outside cameraman.

(Emphasis mine) this last bit is surprising to me. Given that the US rating bodies (the manufacturers) went out of their way to provide rules governing camera flyers, and that we all know what an important part of the skydive they are - results and safety wise - this seems like a bit of an omission.

That depends upon your definition of "training." "Training" new TIs is off-to-the-side of regular operations.

OTOH If you are "training" young students to do anything more than bore holes in the sky (e.g. freefall turns, read altimeter, pull ripcord, steer canopy, etc.) then those tandem jumps are part of regular "student" operations.